


On the steps of the palace (Ravenna & Snow White, PG-13)

by sevendeadlyfun



Category: Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)
Genre: Gen, OMG my feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-11
Updated: 2012-07-11
Packaged: 2017-11-09 15:22:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/456995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sevendeadlyfun/pseuds/sevendeadlyfun





	On the steps of the palace (Ravenna & Snow White, PG-13)

So, I watched "Snow White & The Huntsman" a little while back. NGL, I found the whole movie profoundly disturbing. Like, on a visceral level. It was the patriarchy, but with a soundtrack and special effects. I kept thinking, there is no way this can get any creepier, and then Chris Hemsworth made his whole speech over her dead body? And I thought I might possibly run screaming out of the theater.

But, I was also struck by how similar Ravenna and Snow White end up being, particularly in terms of how their lives and their gifts are essentially tools, used by and for the men around them. I wanted to write a story from Ravenna's perspective, based on the bits of backstory we see in the movie, and how she could come to view Snow White not as an enemy but as her own daughter.

Now, that doesn't make this not fucked up. This story is total fuckeduppery, in part because Ravenna was incredibly victimized and her own victimization colors and warps her perspective of all the events around her. She is emphatically not a reliable narrator. But I would have liked to see a story where a woman who was clearly a victim was not cast as evil for reacting to her victimization. I'm not sure this is that story, either, but I'm happier with where it goes than I was with the movie and really that's what fic is all about.

 **On the steps of the palace**  
SWATH; Ravenna & Snow White; PG-13

 

Even though she choreographed every movement of the invasion with the might of her magic and the strength of her hate, she is not pleased by its stunning success. Every time, she hopes to be wrong. Every time, she is disappointed.

The weapons thrust into her unwilling body by her frantic mother have found their mark and again, she is not pleased. She is bruised and battered in her cramped quarters, eyes blinking furiously against the blinding sun’s invasion, and he is enraptured.  They are always enraptured.

She is always enraged.

While the lines have grown careworn with age, she performs them flawlessly. Once, perhaps, she saw this as a game – a challenge – besting foolish men armed only with her low cunning and her sex. She soon realized that very little cunning is required once there is sex.

She looks forward to shedding this hateful skin, to becoming once again herself. Freedom is something she has never had, not since the long-ago childhood she can only remember in brilliant, painful flashes. But living without obligation is a kind of freedom and it is the only kind she longs for now.

So she keeps her secrets and holds her true self in abeyance, hidden under the soft voice and dutiful gestures of her creation. She suffers the caresses and kisses of the King, his rough fingers and foul breath invading the sensitive folds of her body.  She waits, as she waited a hundred times, for her moment.

But this moment comes with novelty. The little girl is something new. None of the others had a daughter.

Ravenna watches her furtively, following the track of her tiny steps. The grace of her small form attracts the eyes of everyone and no one suspects her reasons for watching. She is careful, as she has always been careful. She holds her plan aloof from even her dearest brother.

As the wedding day approaches, Ravenna begins to alter the script – the act of change itself a precious gift that she is absurdly grateful to receive.

Walking down the aisle, she glances over her shoulder and is relieved. Her tiny shadow, so dark where she is fair, still dogs her steps. She recites the words of the mirror in her head, letting the prophecy drown out the noise and bustle of the wedding.

_There is another destined to surpass you._

She  has never given thought to her legacy, to the idea of raising up another woman who will share her power and her strength. But the mirror never lies. This little girl will surpass her, will take the power she now wields and in so doing, finish the battles she has begun.

The child and the prophecy turn this wedding night into something altogether different than all the ones that came before. She slides the knife in gently, a clean kill, so that Snow White will not be grieved to see the body of her father bloodied and rent. She gives his cooling corpse the words that he could not hear in life. She reassures him she will always, always, have a care for his daughter. Still, she is relieved to wash him from her body, relieved to finally have done with the messy business of his death.

There is resistance. There is always resistance. Duke Hammond tests his sword against her magics, grieving for his lost Magnus. She wishes for the sake of her new daughter that she could spare him, wishes there were light enough to illuminate how wrong he is to give such loyalty to a man unworthy to be king.

But the battle is called and she is out of time for words. Finn arrays her troops throughout the castle, swords and fire at the ready. The clash of swords and clamor of armor wakes Snow White and she rushes pell-mell in to the battle.

“Stop her!” Ravenna’s shout carries out across the noise and press of the fight. She cannot keep the urgency and fear from her voice, cannot keep the magics contained, and only when Finn wrests Snow White from her flight does Ravenna breath easy.

The Duke flees on horseback, likely headed to his stronghold across the mountains. Ravenna does not care. She has the prize she sought and when she is strong, when she is ready, Snow White will take back from the Duke what he has stolen from them. She arrays herself on her new throne, watching and waiting impassively, as Finn carries Snow White across the audience chamber.

“What does she want from me?” The little girl, her face streaked black with smoke and heavy with exhaustion, whispers urgently. Her voice carries and Ravenna listens in anguished satisfaction to the answer her brother gives.

“Your heart, my dear.”

 


End file.
